


With You I Am Home

by SOMNlARl



Category: Dragon Age, Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Diabetes of the soul inducing fluff at the end, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-18
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-31 03:36:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3962941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SOMNlARl/pseuds/SOMNlARl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Corypheus is defeated and Dorian plans to return to Tevinter. Cullen needs time before he can join him. </p><p> </p><p>  <i>One year.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	With You I Am Home

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, just a fluffy little monster that insisted I write it last night. This was supposed to be a headcanon. HEADCANON brain, why u no? 
> 
> If you like it please comment! Comments are life. <3
> 
> tumblr: xhermionedanger

For the first few months after they defeat Corphyeus life goes on as usual. There’s still work to be done, troops to train, rifts to seal and alliances to cement. They don’t talk about after. Dreadful thing, after. But it can’t last forever and the amount of work, for Dorian at least, slows to a trickle. No new tomes appear in the library courtesy of Lavellan and as he hunts through the books on his shelves he realizes he’s read them all three times at least. There are no more hidden groups of Venatori to hunt down, no more existing rifts and no new ones appearing since the Breach was closed and his mind inevitably turns to Tevinter. Home. He’s quieter now, lost in thought and one night, over a leisurely meal and a bottle of Ghislain he looks up at Cullen and says what they both knew had to be coming. 

“I’m… thinking of going back to Tevinter. I need to try to fix things there, make my homeland better.” He looks back down, focusing hard on his plate, waiting for the response. It’s a few long, silent minutes before he chances a look up at Cullen who’s staring at him, a small, sad smile on his lips; fingers of one hand working at the back of his neck, kneading until the soft skin there burns, the way they always do when he’s upset or overwhelmed. 

“You could come with me, you know. They’d absolutely adore you in Minrathous. All that blonde hair and skin pale as milk, they’d find you so exotic I’d have to beat them off of you with my staff.”

Cullen huffs a small laugh at the image, the tension in his shoulders easing slightly but he doesn’t reply. 

“Cullen. _Amatus_. Maker knows I don’t want to leave you. This is just… something I’ve been thinking of for a very long time and I need to do it. t might be futile but I need to try. And… I did mean my offer. You could come with me. As much as there are those in the Imperium who would not approve and might make it uncomfortable for us I would very much like it if you came.”

A few more minutes of silence pass with the air in the room hanging heavily between them despite the open windows. 

“A year,” Cullen says abruptly. 

Dorian blinks. “I’m sorry?”

“Give me one year.” Cullen shrugs apologetically, the furred tips of his mantle quivering in the cool, autumn breeze. “There is still much for me to do that I must finish here. There’s still Inquisition business to finalize and before I leave Ferelden again I must make my peace with my family. Give me one year, one dreadful year of us being apart, and I will join you.”

Dorian feels his heart simultaneously sink within his chest and swell with delight. 

_One year_. 

One miserable, lonely year. 

But there were letters and Leliana’s birds could certainly make it to Tevinter if she could be talked into giving one up. And then at the end of it Cullen would come. He promised. 

_One year_. 

Dorian swallows hard past the lump rising in his throat, blinks away the prickle of hot water collecting in the corner of his eyes and nods, fixing a smile before looking up at Cullen. 

“One year.”

The next few weeks pass too quickly as Dorian gets his affairs in order. A week before he’s due to leave to catch his ship Cullen is called away to oversee troop maneuvers near Redcliffe. 

“Don’t worry, my heart. I’ll be back before you leave,” he says as he presses a soft kiss to Dorian’s mouth, ruffling the mage’s hair into disarray with a hand. 

But he isn’t back. The days come and go, each shorter than the last and Dorian would swear until his dying day that his last week alone in Skyhold was the coldest he’d ever felt since he came down south. 

The morning of his journey wakes alone. Foolish to have hoped the man might be next to him he knows, but the emptiness of the bed beside him aches in a way that has become distant like the nagging echoes of a bruise that never quite heals. He dresses quickly and slips down the stairs to the courtyard, not wanting to attract any more attention than absolutely necessary. 

It doesn’t work. What looks to be half of Skyhold is already there, waiting for him. 

There’s a bear hug from the Bull, so tight it nearly knocks the wind from him. A softer hug from Josephine and a small, silk pouch pressed into his hand. At a questioning look she murmurs “candied ginger, for the journey. I know you don’t care for sea travel.” A nod and a small smile from the Seeker, then a decisive “You will do good things, Dorian. I have faith in you.” 

Sera nearly tackles him and as she clings to him she sniffs back a sob. “Now don’t you go getting all Magister-y on me, yeah? I find out you’ve learned how to laugh like Coryphenis and I’ll put an arrow in yer eye.” She glares at him before she races up the stairs towards the tavern. Cole appears out of nowhere and presses something into his hand, then disappears again in a cloud of soft, blue smoke. It’s another wooden duck, smaller this time and Dorian slips it into his pocket with a smile. 

Varric brings him a book. “For the journey, Sparkler. It’ll make the weeks at sea feel like nothing.” It’s his latest installment of Swords & Shields, a sneak peek no less because it won’t come off the presses for another month. When the dwarf isn’t looking Dorian tries to give it to Cassandra. She blushes lightly and shakes her head, whispering “I… already have a copy of that one.” 

Lavellan cries openly as she hugs him but when she pulls away she is smiling. “You will do such wonderful things, Dorian. I know it. Please write, or I will have to come to Tevinter myself to make sure you’re well.” And he promises he will but insists that she come visit anyway. Perhaps elves are not always treated well in the Imperium but if he accomplishes anything there he will make sure that the Inquisitor is welcome. 

Even Blackwall is there, the two having brokered an uneasy peace over the last year. But with a nod, a strong handshake and a clap on Dorian’s back he’s gone, back to the stables. 

Dorian waits as long as he can, looking for Cullen’s familiar silhouette on the battlements. Perhaps the warrior arrived back so late during the night that he thought better to let Dorian sleep, knowing the journey that awaited him? He had _promised_ to be back to say goodbye. And yet he isn't here and now the carriage driver is calling for him. 

Dorian sighs heavily, wraps his cloak tightly across his chest and climbs aboard, hardly paying attention until there’s the clang of another heavy chest being loaded into the back. 

“Just a delivery, my Lord. Ambassador’s orders, to be taken along to Val Royeaux for one of the merchants. Don’t you worry, it won’t slow us down none,” the driver says, expertly flicking the reins. 

Dorian sighs again, settling back against the rich cushions lining the interior of the carriage. It was going to be a very long eight days, at least he had a volume of decent early Tevinter history to keep him occupied, one of the last that Lavellan had managed to procure for him. 

And it was a very long eight days. Each morning they woke before the sun rose over the Frostbacks and travelled from dawn ‘til dusk, only stopping to see to the basest of necessities. Nights were spent in one dusty, ill-kept inn after another. At least the inkeepers had drinkable wine, Dorian thinks each night before he collapses, half-heartedly into one lumpy bed and then the next. 

On the eighth day Dorian rises early, having had no sleep the night before. He vaguely remembers a game of Wicked Grace with two dwarves and an elf but mercifully his coin purse is just as heavy as it had been when he fingers it the morning after. 

Dorian lingers over breakfast as long as he can, even though the fare is basic; he picks at the offered porridge, a little honey, berries picked from the bushes surrounding the lake. It’s dreadful, as almost everything in the south has been dreadful but still, he lingers. He doesn’t know what he waits for anymore. 

It’s a long walk from the inn to the pier with the ship waiting for him and he takes his time, pausing to remember every sight, every smell, every sound. It would be one whole year until he felt any of this again. Without Cullen it would be too painful to remember; he’d lock himself away throw himself into his work and drink to dull it. 

_One year_. 

One year until he has anything more than a visceral memory of his years down south. One year until he remembers the smell of petrichor. One year until he can taste turnip stew again, the one thing he swore he hated but would secretly crave until he tasted it again. One year until he feels strong arms again, one year until there was stubble pressing against the smooth skin of his cheek, one year until Cullen’s arms fold across his chest, pulling him closer until the nightmares stop. 

And yet when he leaves the inn the last morning the one thing he sees is a halo of golden curls quivering in the early morning sunrise over the docks. The silhouette of a man so familiar he could trace the lines of his body in his sleep. 

“Cullen?” He whispers, taking another step towards the figure, voice so soft it wouldn’t be heard if this was yet another perfect, devastating illusion. 

And then the man turns to him, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips, teasing at the scar running through them, the one that Dorian loves to trace his fingers across before a kiss. 

“Dorian…” Cullen breathes, a hand reaching out to trail along his arm. 

“You… were supposed to be staying.” 

“Yes,” Cullen replies before he leans in to capture Dorian’s mouth in a soft, searching kiss. 

An unspoken question. _Do you still want me? Do you still need me? Do you still love me?_

And the answer Cullen receives is _yes. Yes. Yes, for the rest of my life, yes_. 

“You came…” Dorian whispers, his voice hidden in the ticklish furs of Cullen’s mantle, the scent that he can’t rid from his memory. The one that has come to feel like home. 

“You came… to say goodbye.” Dorian leans in until he is forehead to forehead with the blonde, his lips teasing at the man’s scarred lips, the mouth that awaits him.

“Not goodbye,” Cullen replies moving to nip at his neck.

“I’m coming with you, my heart. When I realized that this last mission would leave me unable to say goodbye… and at least a year before I could hold you again…” Dorian feels the touch of an arm across his shoulder, lips pressing against the hollow divot where neck met collarbone. 

“I might have been able to stand one year without you but one year and a week… and not being able to say goodbye?”

“One year might have been possible but any longer? I had to see you… had to offer to come with you. If you’ll have me, of course.”

Dorian feels soft lips pressing against his own, a tongue probing, pressing deeper until it catches his entire mouth. Cullen tastes like vanilla and spice and he deepens their kiss until he could almost choke on it. 

“Please don’t leave… not without me…” Cullen finds himself whimpering, a hand pressing into the small of his lover’s back. 

“Never without you, _Amatus_.”

Dorian winds his fingers through Cullen’s, turning to look at the warrior’s face.

“Your trunk?’

“Mine. I sent Josephine a bird when it became clear I would not return before you left. She had my things packed, had them sent ahead with you. In case you might want me.”

“Of course… who else could it be but our delightful lady ambassador? i suppose I shall have to send her a fruit basket.” Dorian leans towards him, nearly moaning as he falls against the man’s side for the first time in weeks, relishing in the warmth of him, the weight of the man’s arm across his shoulder. 

“I… don’t think this will be easy, my heart. But you… you are worth whatever struggles we face in Tevinter.”

“And your family? Did you…”

“I wrote to Mia, she’ll tell the rest. I’ll write again once we reach Minrathous. They’ve gone longer thinking me dead, this will be enough.”

Softly-calloused fingers tangle through his own, a thumb rubs soft, slow circles against him palm and Dorian makes a small noise of pleasure that catches in the back of his throat. 

“Shall we catch our ship? I think it’s time to go home.”

 _Home_. 

“Home? You’re calling Tevinter home already, Amatus? Shouldn’t you wait until you’ve seen it?”

“I don’t have to, my heart. I’ll be with you. You are my home.”


End file.
